Self-help gurus: the modern day faeries
I pilfered this from a facebook post that a friend made. The article talks about why we still have crazy beliefs, as in gods, witches, faeries, supernatural powers, and other paranormal phenomena. For the charlatans and hustlers, they promote these for personal financial gains. What about for the rest of us? Why do we still have these beliefs?
This story reminds me of another recent article about how optical illusions work and because our brains predict the future in order to compensate for the delay in the arrival of immediate visual information. I wonder if a similar explanation on how we fill in gaps within our knowledge by appealing to something magical. This might also explain why many people like to interpret their dreams. The consensus among cognitive scientists and biologists is that dreaming is important in solidifying memories and for our survival; but there is no good explanation for why and what we dream about, and even the basics of how we dream!
I think the price for having the neocortex to facilitate higher order cognitive functions, one defect is our constant need to fill in gaps within our knowledge base. If we don't get enough information or at the speed required for survival, our brain naturally projects ahead and fills in gaps in order for the world to make sense. What we fill in the gap is often ruled by emotions with deeper psychological origins.
As alluded to by a commenter here, in a society where we have turned not only material goods, but our hopes and dreams, ideas, and even our very own happiness into a commodity, we think we can buy and sell them at a price. Not only have we relinquished our reasoning ability, but we are becoming dependent on others to satisfy our own needs. Back in the early days of the industrial revolution, the cure for depression (and unhappiness) was "industry," as in working harder. With the advent of computers, especially with many IT guys sitting around surfing the net all day without the pressure to produce or physical demands, we have more time to indulge in silly hobbies and preoccupy our minds with ideas bombarded into us by marketeers. I thought this might be a uniquely American phenomenon, but I think with more people sitting around instead of doing physical labor, we have become physically, intellectually, and socially lazy.
We now buy into the whole self-hype movement. What I have noticed recently, and I'm not sure if this is unique to the seduction community, have you noticed how many Jews are in the pickup business? Now, before anyone accused me of being Hitler for outting those gays and incarcerate them into concentration camps, just count how many of them are among the top self-hype gurus: Style, RJ, David D, Thunderfag, Swingcat, Sinn, David X, (half-breed) Savoy,... I don't think that there's any Illuminati-type conspiracy going on, but it is interesting to note that such a disproportionately high number of one ethnic group within a particular community. They become such experts at selling dreams and fantasies to guys. What's your explanation for these faeries?
3 comments:
Are you sure Tyler Durden isn't Jewish? There's a characteristic to Jewish men's voices where they don't support their voice and he certainly has it.
As a yid myself, I'd have to say that Jewish men have to learn pick-up out of necessity. Jewish girls are really tough because every Jewish guy in the world hits on them in hopes of appeasing their mothers. And their egos get fed every time they turn down a non-Jew. The result is that fives and sixes act like eights. Really tough. Add to that the observation that the distribution of Jewish girl attractiveness is bimodal (there's fives and then there's eights, but there's not a whole lot in-between). A Jewish guy's got to think, if I just go to a bar and hit on random girls, I could probably do better. And Jewish guys tend to be a little more bookish and systematizing. Also, they might not have grown up with the type of social network that would put them into contact with the right type of girls socially. So to even find wingmen, they have to go online.
Not sure if TD is Jewish, let me know what you find out! :)
Not only are there more Jewish guys in the community, but there are more of them becoming gurus! I don't want people to come away thinking there's a cabal of Jews trying to take advantage of naive guys in the community. But I think there are more Jews in this because they have traits you described and also work much harder.
However, that doesn't mean what they teach and discuss is that useful.
There are a lot of Canadians too - what's up with that?
As a Jew myself, I'm gonna weigh in. I think that it's a stretch about Jewish girls/Jewish mothers/etc. As a Jewish guy, I don't seek out Jewish girls (Asian girls on the other hand...), and many J-guys feel the same.
Here is the reason for the prevalence of Jewish men as founders of the community: Jews tend to be smarter. Look up Jewish IQ in Google -- even though it feels politically incorrect to say it, Jews have +10 IQ on average over the general population. Obviously, this doesn't mean all Jews are smarter than non-Jews, so don't get offended...
However, generally speaking, Jewish men have higher analytical capacities and IQs. We also seem to have more inclination towards neurosis and self-consciousness (probably a result of our higher awareness and higher cognitive abilities, which further inclines us to this course of study).
Saying that Jews are in this because pick-up is profitable is like saying Jews are professors at Ivy League schools or winning the top prizes in physics and math (again, look it up) because of the money, as if anyone could do it. It's simply because of high brain power (I feel like I have to keep apologizing -- I'm not saying that Jews have a monopoly on talent or intelligence).
Mark Twain (non-Jew) said that Jews are the "intellectual aristocracy." 'nuff said.
Even if you think that Ross Jefferies (yuck, he makes us all look bad) is full of shit, you gotta admit that most people can't break things down like him and do whatever the hell it is that he does. David D. = same. TD (is he a Jew??) = same. Now those PUAs that have the Latin lover vibe, they probably aren't gonna be Jewish.
Further, as K. mentioned, Jews - like many minorities - emphasize education, which further refines the capacity for analytical thought.
Anyway B-man, you're wrong to say that Jews specialize in selling people impossible pursuits -- that's not a feature of us. It is a feature of Jews to rise to the top in many fields, and then to be accused of conspiracy and only helping other Jews when we get there (some of which could be based on fact).
(Sorry for writing so much. If I had more time, I'd be more brief, to paraphrase M. Twain again).
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